The Nizkor Project
by Enchanted Bohemian
Summary: The Real World. Harsh and cruel, but the Truth no less. Yet Neo begins to realise that the ‘Real World’ itself may not be what it seems and it’s a young psychologically unhinged operator who begins to make him understand… CHAP 2!!!!
1. A Question

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The Nizkor Project 

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**Note:** I'm not going to reveal what "Nizkor" means yet, but as a clue: It's a Hebrew word! Also, this is continued from the Matrix reloaded by the way! Oh, and I quote one line from the film, but as I've only seen it once, I'm not sure if its accurate...you'll know which one it is if you've seen it...  
  
**Disclaimer:** No, I really am one the WACHOWSKI Brothers…and this is the plot for the third film…NOT! Nope…I do not own ANY of the first two matrix films or the characters in them, but I do own my own characters and the ideas for my plot…even if they do end up being in the third film…then that just proves I'm a genius… *grin*  
  
  
  


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All is black. Then, like water dripping sideways across the screen, two alternate strings of green font type speedily across it:   
  
  
What are you looking for?   
  
_A Question. _  
  
Not an Answer?   
  
_People who look for answers usually don't know the question. They just expect it to be some universally unknown question mark looming over us all.   
  
_ And then?   
  
_That's the point…there is no 'then'. We're never meant to get that far…  
  
_ Why?   
  
_Soon, very soon my future is going to stop. I don't see myself going into training. I don't see myself getting married, having kids or getting a regular job. I don't see myself growing old…  
  
_ So what then? You'll die? Just because you lack imagination?   
  
_Perhaps. Death is something I don't understand. Maybe that is why I can't see my life progressing past the end of school.   
  
_ Maybe you just don't understand life beyond what you know…  
  
_Exactly…  
  
_ Why do you keep asking yourself such awkward questions?   
  
_Because no-one else will…  
_  
  
  
The screen remains still before wiping blank again in one swift flicker.   
  
  


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Thomas suddenly jerked back in his chair. He had fallen asleep at his desk again…the hard indentations of the keyboard made a little chess-board pattern across his pale cheek. He'd been doing that a lot recently…  
  
Blinking hard and trying to clear his head, he glared hard at the screen before him. The black screen seared by lines of white coding informed him he had been halfway through programming a certain task sequence, but for the life of him, he couldn't remember what…or what for…but there was something more then that. Or at least, Thomas felt as if there should be more than that.   
  
Swivelling in his chair, he glanced out of his office block's slim entrance into the one opposite him. Kev was puffing away at his keyboard as usual, the layers of his huge backside bulging over the sides of his poor, straining chair. Thomas watched Kev, but his mind was looking beyond the fat man in the desk block beside him. Something wasn't…right.   
  
Trying to think beyond his office was like trudging through a thick white mist and it was irresistible to simply stand still and allow it to flow round you, closing in tighter and tighter.   
  
"Message for Mr. Anderson?" came a young voice wringing with the squeakiness of the typical teenage mail-boy, cutting through Tom's thoughts. The spotty lad held out a large brown envelope.   
  
Thomas Anderson blinked at the boy. It seemed strange to hear himself being addressed like that, but he still couldn't think why…this was the Office afterall. It was how his workmates (what few there were) knew him. It was how his boss addressed him.   
  
Taking the envelope, Thomas nodded a vague thanks to the boy and teared its edge off. He pulled out its only contents: A piece of paper with an image that filled the whole of one side. He stared hard at it, holding it up close to his face. His face remained a picture of bafflement, but his mind raced as like an impulse on a motherboard.   
  
_What the…? _   
  
There was nothing on the back of the picture or envelope to say where it was from. He immediately stood up and looked over the walls of his small office-square to see where the message boy had gone, and as he did so, it was as if the distant noisy buzz of the Office had accelerated and slammed right into a wall of silence.   
  
The whole room had become empty. Kev was no-longer in his block. There was no-way that fat 'oaf could've moved _that_ fast! Thomas looked down at the picture again. It showed a picture of himself sitting at his desk holding a piece of paper up close to his face and staring hard at it…and _that_ piece of paper had a picture of himself holding a piece of paper up close to his face and staring hard at it…  
  
"Neo!"   
  
The pain of confusion pulsed through his mind again.   
  
"Neo…"  
  
The hard and intense voice seemed to come from right beside him… and yet from right inside of him…but it was a woman's voice. But no-one else knew of that name? Or at least didn't connect it to _him_…   
  
He listened hard into the matt, dead air of the Office, but all he heard was his heavy quick breaths. He waited, hardly moving, looking back down at the picture. The voice filled his mind again…   
  
"See this hand? It's not letting go. It's never letting go."   
  
The depth of its sound made him shiver slightly. His pulse raced at the sound of it. But he was still alone in the room... Turning the paper over, he studied it again but noticed a small mark in one corner. Peering closely at it, he saw it to be a small black symbol he had never seen before. It was of a vertical straight line that had two other straight lines branching off parallel to one another from the top of the vertical line and pointing diagonally down away from it.   
  
As he studied it, the Office around him faded into a busy New York main street. Looking up in time to be bumped and knocked like a pinball by the ruthless herds of businessmen and civilians, he somehow didn't feel too alarmed to be suddenly transferred from his office to the street in the blink of an eye…but still frustrated confusion laid heavy on his face.   
  
He knew this place…he knew that he shouldn't be alarmed…but why!! The paper was still in his hand, crumpling from the sweat of his grip.   
  
"Neo!"   
  
The voice came from ahead of him, through the surging streams of bodies that were stampeding in his direction. He tried to battle his way through the crowds. Suitcases scraped at him, elbows jostled at him, sweat dripped slowly down his temples. He had to reach that voice…  
  
"Neo!"   
  
Through the crowds of on-coming black suits and white shirts, he watched as a lady in a red dress walked by him…  



	2. You gotta have faith

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The Nizkor Project 

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Chapter 2 - You gotta have Faith...

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**Note:** Confused? Don't worry. If it was simple then it wouldn't be interesting. Thanks for reviewing guys, it means a lot to me that people care enough to leave a comment or criticism. Ivy: We shall have to wait and see what happens...but I translated Nizkor slightly differently. I have to say, I am not a hebrew speaker myself, but I found this word and its meaning on another site and it gave me the idea for a plot...  
  
**Disclaimer:** No, I really am one the WACHOWSKI Brothers…and this is the plot for the third film…NOT! Nope…I do not own ANY of the first two matrix films or the characters in them, but I do own my own characters and the ideas for my plot…even if they do end up being in the third film…then that just proves I'm a genius… *grin*  
  
  
  


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All is black. Then, like water dripping sideways across the screen, two alternate strings of green font type speedily across it:   
  
  
Are you there?   
  
_Not entirely…but why ask what you already know? _  
  
I don't always know everything that's going on. That's not my purpose.   
  
_Don't get me started on that. Having a purpose is like having a religion…and I reckon religion has caused more problems than anything else in the…erm, past.  
  
_ No, purpose is like faith. It gives us faith, and faith gives us purpose.   
  
_But what happens when we lose one or the other?  
  
_ We become obsolete.   
  
_Humans are not programmes! They can't just be deleted for losing the way…  
  
_ Perhaps.   
  
_Have to go. Someone's coming.  
  
_   
  
  
The screen remains still before wiping blank again in one swift flicker.   
  
  


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The soft irregular hums and secret mechanical whirrings of the ships engines seemed almost soothing when accompanied by Neo's soft breathing. Trinity placed a hand on his chest. She watched it as it rose and fell with the expansion of his ribs and their retraction. She had hoped to feel his usual intense warmth pulsing in time with the thud of his heart…but he had remained quite cold these past few hours. He had not so much as flinched since the incident, since he was brought in and laid out here. She could barely feel his dull and tired pulse beneath her fingers.   
  
"Neo."   
  
Her voice sounded dead and numb in the still, stagnant air of the medical lab. She wanted it to echo out to its far walls…she wanted the thousands of Sentinels outside to hear her…she wanted the world to hear her voice…she wanted _him_ to hear her…where ever he was in his mind.   
  
"Neo…"   
  
But it simply sounded like a pathetic plea. She would never allow any of the crew to see her like this, but part of her was scared… she had never truly feared for Neo's life before now, because there was some part of her that knew he was The One. He had Morpheus' undying belief as his weapon and a prophecy as his proof. She somehow knew inside of her that he couldn't die until he had succeeded. Succeeded in his purpose. But now he had no purpose. He had told them himself he was not meant to succeed in anything. It was as if he had entered the real world for the first time and now he truly could die at any point, just like the rest of them.   
  
Her other hand fumbled for his hand. It was even colder than it had been an hour ago. It hung limp in her grip.   
  
"See this hand? It's not letting go. It's never letting go." She said in a breathless whisper, her voice threatening to choke. But she would not cry. Tears had threatened to surface earlier, but she would not yield.   
  
Right then, luck did not allow her to blink because if she did blink, she would have missed it; Neo's eyes flickered for a second. It was a flicker similar to when someone is dreaming in their sleep, and you can see the pupil beneath their eyelids moving rapidly. But it was only for a second.   
  
"Neo…Neo!" she whispered desperately, gripping his hand so hard it began to turn purple. She wondered what struggle, what trial he was having to push his way through in his mind.   
  
"Dreams."   
  
Trinity whipped her head round. It had been a 'matter of fact' voice, and Trinity had sensed a slight hint of a condescending tone in it. It also belonged to Neo's fellow patient sharing the lab…the only remaining human found in the battlefield outside of Zion when the whole fleet of ships had been destroyed.   
  
"I thought you were still unconcious." She said blankly. She seemed almost offended that he may have been watching and listening to her.   
  
"Well I'm obviously _not_." He replied with slow sarcasm. Grimacing in pain, he sat up and swung his legs over the side of the flat surface he had been laid on. Leaning back on his hands, he smirked at her before looking down at Neo. "Dreams." He repeated simply. "There's no telling what kind of things happen when you're trapped inside your own mind".   
  
Laying Neo's hand back down, Trinity's face hardened. "You shouldn't be moving around yet. And after all, after the ordeal _you've_ been through, I'm surprised you're even alive when hundreds were slaughtered around you." She said bluntly, keeping her face hard and her eyes enigmatic. She had found his whole discovery a strange and suspicious incident despite her crew's amazed awe of him, yet she didn't want him to know of this right away.   
  
"And I'm sure you'll have plenty to tell us when you have recovered a little more, Bane…" came Morpheus' deep curious voice as he entered the room. Trinity continued to stare fixedly at the stranger, studying his features. Watching for any flickers in his face that may betray his secret.   
  
"Please do not rely too heavily on me, I - hit my head quite hard at one point. I do not remember much at all, if anything."   
  
"Of course." Trinity couldn't help but add bluntly, raising an eyebrow sceptically at him.   
  
"We understand. You must rest now. Then maybe your memory will return to you." Morpheus added calmly. He did not wish to be as blatant as Trinity with his emotions to this stranger, who nodded and returned back to lying on his back and closed his eyes. Morpheus stepped forward to stand behind Trinity and laid his hand on her shoulder. "And how's he doing?" he asked. Trinity finally removed her glare from the mystery man and over to Neo.   
  
"Not good, he's cold and his pulse rate is low. Although…" she paused thoughtfully, thinking it may sound stupid to tell him what she saw, "I think we haven't lost him quite yet. He's still in there somewhere…"   
  
Looking back up at her tall captain, her eyes asked many questions, but Morpheus' eyeline directed her own over to the seemingly 'sleeping' stranger. Understanding his hint, they both began to leave the room. Before leaving, Trinity turned her head back once more to Neo.   
  
"He'll be fine. We shall be checking on him regularly. He's coming back to us Trinity. You know that." He reassured her so strongly she had no choice but to accompany him along the corridors of the ship. "You should rest too." He added.   
  
Trinity sighed sharply. "I couldn't sleep even if I tried. What are we to do now? We can't get to Zion, we can't stay here and everything we've worked for…believed in…is _gone_." Her voice began to rise intensely, "I don't believe anyone has had as much faith in you as I have ever had Morpheus; faith in you and Neo, even in our darkest hours. But now…I don't think belief matters anymore. Belief is meant to be that magic thing that if you have it, then you don't have to worry because part of you knows it's going to be ok. Everything will turnout ok…until you realise that being human means 'ok' is about as real as the matrix". She looked up into his large black eyes. "What does it mean Morpheus? You said this would all end…and now the only thing Zion had left is gone….its hope, its faith."   
  
Morpheus let her talk. He could feel her anger flowing in his veins too. He too shared many of her passionate sentiments, but he processed them a lot faster and clearer than she did. "I don't know what it means Trinity, but I do know this is happening for a reason. It would seem Neo learnt a lot more than he's willing to tell us when he entered that building…and perhaps it effected him…for better or for worse, I cannot say. We can only wait. And I'm asking you now Trinity, you can choose to believe in one thing, or you can choose to believe in another…but being human also means you have to believe in something…what is it you would rather believe in?", his eyes lingered on her as they reached the central operation room of the ship. 

  
  
*****  
  


Back in the med-lab, a pair of eyes slipped open, listening hard for the voices that were fading away down the hall. When they were barely audible, he sat up once again and swivelled himself to sit over the edge of his bed again but this time with ease and no sign of pain. A smirk slithered across his face as he looked down at the man lying on the table next to him. Without the tall daunting coat, conservative black shades and heavy black boots, he looked as 'all-powerful' as a bent spoon. Bane smiled to himself. It was all too easy. After all that had happened, after what this man had put him through, after taking away the one thing that stopped him from deprogramming himself whilst inside the matrix - his purpose - here was the very man who did it all. Helpless.   
  
Standing up, Bane enclosed his hand around a small surgical blade from a nearby table. Walking over to where Neo lay, he gripped it so tightly his hand began to tremble. With wide eyes that shone with an insane satisfaction, he raised the blade to Neo's neck. He pressed its tip lightly against one side of it, pressing the skin down without cutting it. Bane's mind raced as fast as his quick erratic breathing. Well, it wasn't strictly _Bane's_ mind that was racing… It's true inhabitant had found the human body an interesting place to occupy. More than interesting…it was illogical and irregular. He had trouble complying with its repulsiveness at first, but soon began to use it to his advantage.   
  
Twisting the blade slightly and preparing to swipe it swiftly across while inserting it deeper, he stopped. His smile faded. He pulled away his hand. His eyes stared beyond the body in front of him, beyond Mr. Anderson. They glistened slightly. Another smile slowly graced upon his lips.   
  
"No. This is too easy." He whispered hoarsely, "Too easy for _you_."   
  
Returning to his lie back on his table-top, he slipped the blade into a pocket on the inside of his jacket. If he had learnt anything from humans during his many cycles of years of dealing with them, it was that there are worse things than immediate death…   
  


  
  
*****  
  


Thomas turned his head away from her and back to where the voice was coming from, but something in his mind told him to look back round. Just look…just a quick look back…   
  
He whipped his head back round to see the lady in the red dress once more - and a gun cocked in his face. Everything around him froze. People in mid-walk, pigeons in mid-flight and into the noise erupted a sudden silence. Thomas was looking right down the barrel of a black handgun. Over it, he saw the figure of a man about his own height wearing a long straight black coat, black shades and a stern expressionless face. Thomas blinked. It was _himself_. Yet he still had to ask the criminally stupid question: "Who are you?" he croaked.   
  
The figure did not flinch. He hardly appeared to be breathing. After a few lingering moments of silence in which Thomas studied him uncomfortably, the figure spoke.   
  
"I am Neo."   
  
Thomas let out an exasperated breath and furrowed his brow. "That can't be…that's my alias name…you can't be real…" he said, almost wanting to laugh with absurdity of it all.   
  
"I am more real than you can imagine. It is you who is not real. You are a part of my past. You are not essential anymore."   
  
"What?" Thomas breathed, taking a step backwards, "Why am I here? Why are _you_ here? What the hell is going on?!" he staggered even further back, panting heavily, sweat beginning to penetrate through his white office shirt.   
  
Neo remained still. "I am what you became. I am The One. You only exist here now, in my mind."   
  
Thomas began to feel sick, somehow he knew that these words were true and that made him feel even more sick. "What the hell are you then? What have I become? Some kind of machine? You don't even seem human…"   
  
"I've come to realise, being human is a weakness. You are that weakness. You doubt yourself, you torture yourself with guilt, you lie to yourself with false belief and false hope and you still deny your purpose. You have become obsolete."   
  
Thomas knew it sounded just like his own voice, but yet it wasn't. It was different. It had changed. With anger freshly glinting in his eyes, helooked up at the man who had called himself Neo. "And so you're going to kill me? Kill part of your mind?"   
  
"Yes. But I'll give you a choice, Mr Anderson. You can stand there and die now, or you can run...and I'll chase."   
  
Thomas' breathing calmed down. The walls of his stomach convulsed strongly, but he straightened up, staring back at himself, staring through those black shades.   
  
"Make your choice."   
  
He tried to see Neo's eyes through those glasses, he tried to see something that at least made him look human…but the black glass seemed impenetrable. _Why has he given me a choice? What difference does it make? How the hell did I become such an arsehole…This must be some kind of dream… _ he thought. _And if it is, I know what to do…_   
  
He stood where he was. Neo standing before him with a gun aimed at his head and Thomas Anderson standing alone and weaponless…and smiling…   
  
  
  
** Ok peeps...I have just kinda had an epiphany with my theories and philosophies...but it would mean I'd have to change what I've written so far. Do you think I should carry on with this and perhaps write a new story with my new theories, or just leave this one or go back and alter this? Hmmm...I'm not sure if I can work in my new theories later on down the plot line...**   
  



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